The Beginner's Guide, or How I Learned to Stop Trolling and Get Along with the Regulars.

This page is designed to provide helpful tips and information to prospective members. If you don't feel you have the time to read it, you are better off going somewhere else rather than wasting your time here where the community is likely to shun you. Just because this is the Internet does not mean you can turn off your brain.

The first and foremost useful piece of advice is to read the following documents.

The Rules explain what you absolutely should not do if you wish to avoid swift and sharp punishment from the channel operators. (Those people with the nifty @ in front of their names.)

The Help gives descriptions of the various IRC like commands available.

Reading and following these documents should set you in fairly good favor with the ops, but that leaves the rest of the users to win over.

A list of things to keep in mind for the general sanity of the community:

A good method to get a feel for the community is to lurk for a short while before trying to join. Just sit and watch the conversations go by. It will give you a glimpse of what you're getting yourself into.

This is primarily, but not exclusively a roleplaying environment. Choose a handle before you join in; it's not a good idea to just leave the name blank. Most people play characters who are not themselves, either original characters or ones from an existing series.

If you want to use characters from an existing series; be it on television or in comics, Japanese or otherwise; it is a good idea to find out whether anyone else is already using them. Having multiple copies of characters is confusing to sort out and reconcile.

Interacting here is a lot like interacting in real life. When you first join, you won't know anyone and will need to make friends. We all started out that way, just talk to people and find common interests. But don't assume you can be completely familiar with people right out of the gate.

As a new member, you may come under fire for a while. If you have respect for people, and are even moderately interesting, this will wear off pretty quickly.

Do not play with the /commands for no reason. Saying "test" or "..." in all the different text styles is annoying and rude. They exist for people to make a point, not for your general amusement. There are examples of what they look like in the help file anyway.

Try to have at least decent grammar, punctuation, and spelling. There are some who don't care, some who care, and others who hate the ones who care. Using proper grammar and spelling correctly makes everyone happy, or at least indifferent.

IMspeak is not outlawed, but it is highly discouraged. This not an IM service. You have time to type complete thoughts and no one will laugh at you...much.

A list of things to keep in mind if your character(s) will have magical powers:

Sparring matches, roleplays, and the occasional fight are not uncommon. Therefore, characters with magical powers are more flexible, but also have more responsibility for the proper use of said powers.

The best thing to do is to decide on what your powers are beforehand, and what they do. Making up things during a match makes it harder for you to be accepted and makes it difficult for others to enjoy the experience. It is also important to decide on your characters' weaknesses. Characters who godmode do not last long as godmoding is against the rules. There may be some characters with godlike powers in residence, but they still have their weaknesses, and they understand the rules.

Do not get into the habit of attacking people randomly. Doing so will seriously jeopardize your chance of being accepted as a regular. If you wish to fight someone in a friendly match, make sure the other person understands your intention and agrees before starting the match.

Use proper etiquette during a match. Do not attempt to sell your attack for your opponent. Examples:

[01:14] > Gunhaver blows a bunch of holes in Blue Lazer's skull.

This is an example of a poor attack. Gunhaver has stated in his attack that Blue Lazer is hit. Without a system to confirm or deny a hit, the result of the attack should be up to Blue Lazer to roleplay.

[01:15] > Gunhaver raises his gun up to Blue Lazer's level, firing a few rounds and rolling away, hoping to cause some damage and get out of danger.

This is a good example. Gunhaver has described his action, in better detail than before, and has left the outcome up to Blue Lazer.

Blue Lazer's responses to each are as follows:

[01:15] [Blue Lazer] O_O I have more than two eyes now! Fan-freaking-tastic!

The poor attack leaves Blue Lazer with only one option, holes in his head.

[01:17] > Blue Lazer quickly ducks behind the Blue Lazer Tank. Some poorly designed bits of hardware are sheared off by the bullets.

The better attack opens an opportunity for creativity and makes the fight more interesting.

When using the battle system in the events room, the outcome of each hit will be determined by the automated system, so assuming that your attack hits would be inappropriate.

And now, welcome to the community!

Written and updated by Kryten (AKA Jondor)

With apologies to Yai and starcat (even though they don't visit here) because they DID contribute to my work and I accidentally removed their names when I reformatted it for my site.